Battle of the Older DAC

jasonbourne71

Go to Audio Science Review and read the test reports ...

Reading ASR is sorta like reading the Onion, but without the wit.

Thank-you for the advice, much appreciated. 

Listening to a variety of DAC options in my own (heavily compromised) room would be the ideal way to go, just limited options to do that. I feel a trip to the closest dealer with a listening room is the next best step. 

Initial take on ASR was interesting, it supported my limited understanding of digital audio (they are just ones and zeros!)

Then had my mind absolutely blown with the very clear difference a different power cable made on the streamer of a high end system.  Still getting over that one.  And now coming around to the fact that every link in the chain can make a difference, some more obvious than others, obviously. A power cord on a streamer...honestly.

And to answer the question that I missed above, budget would top out at USD 2k realistically. Came into this upgrade path wanting a new amp, but that is another story.

I have to disagree I think older Dacs can sound just fine and even really good. Older multibit chips seem all the rage and not much in the way of advances in power supplies or analog output stages so what really improved in the last 10 years? My Dac was built in 1995 and sounds fantastic.

@jond +1

These observations by Vlad, of Audio Mirror, make much sense.

OP: No DAC, by itself, is a silver bullet to fantastic SQ. It takes a system. And a system takes time to build. Stay within your budget. Take your time. And no - streaming is not simply 1’s & 0’s.